This is Magic

On Wrestling for a Better Definition of Success for Our Little Bookshop

These are the nights when the cold presses against the roof and the wood stove burns hot as Hades but is on its way to warm morning embers buried in the ash. These are the nights when we’re too exhausted to fall asleep, when we pick up two different children at two different Halloween parties at 10:30pm after closing the store at 7 and in the intervening time sit in a booth at Friendly’s, her with an ice cream sundae, me with a root beer float, putting in our book order for the week.

It’s at this point in our marriage when I’m pretty sure I could safely order Maile’s Friendly’s Sundae: Reese Cup sundae with extra Reese Cups and peanut butter sauce on the side.

These are the nights when we melt into bed and my hand finds its winding way to hers, and one of us asks the other quietly,

“Were we temporarily insane when we bought this bookstore?”

Sometimes, most times, the question isn’t asked out loud so much as it is felt in the air, and the answer is often nothing more than silence, the autumn wind against the glass. Did we make a mistake the inaudible voice whispers beneath the hum of the fan.

And then the small padded sound of 8-year-old feet down the hall, hesitantly arriving beside the bed, the small voice leaning in, saying in a more tangible whisper, “I’m afraid.”

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At the heart of the question regarding our choice-making abilities, I think, is less a question that can easily be answered and more a deep yearning to truly know what makes something a success.

What makes our lives worth living.

I wonder about success in a business where the margins are tight, where the P&L is stacked against you, where there is construction on Prince Street and the sidewalk on our side is closed, keeping away the random passers-by who used to peek their heads in, drawn by the glow and the hum of books. I wonder about success in a business where every extra dollar doesn’t get socked away to pay for our kids’ college education but simply buys more books or bookshelves or snacks for events. I wonder about success when we have small children who still need us at home and a pile of laundry from the floor up to my waist and I have clients to write for. I wonder about success in a business where people buy their books online so that someone will drive up in a van and drop it on their stoop the next morning, the most sterile of capitalistic cheap thrills, like slipping into a seedy side alley for nothing more than a transaction.

We’ve had events at our bookstore where no one showed up, story times with one child, even an entire day with no sales. We’ve also had events that packed the store, when people barely had room to navigate the aisles, days when we’ve sold more good books than we would have ever thought possible.

What is success?

Seven years ago when my first novel was published, success to me was a New York Times bestseller or a Newbery Medal or a National Book Award. It was being asked to attend all the big conferences and give readings and sign books. It was being recognized on the street. Success was money and being seen and writing something that thousands upon thousands of people loved, something that lived on long after I was gone.

Success.

Now, seven years and five novels later, success in my writing life has shifted into something different, something quieter. Success is writing. Plain and simple. Writing. Sitting down in the early morning quiet or the late night stillness and writing down stories that, perhaps, no one but me will ever read. That’s it. That’s success to me now. Because when the awards come and go and the praise has faded long into the past, all that’s left is to keep writing.

But what about this bookstore? What makes a bookstore successful? When we first opened, the kind of success we envisioned was making enough money so that both of us could work here full time, and continued expansion, and world domination. Success was being busy at the store and filling every event to capacity.

Six months later, what is success?

I don’t know. That question has lost my interest, in these waning days of the fall of 2024, when mad men (and women) fight for power and spread lies and all the world feels like its burning. I feel myself drawn to different questions.

Maybe this is the question:

What actually matters?

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I stand behind the front desk at the bookstore on a Friday evening, a beautiful Friday evening, a Pennsylvania-showing-off-in-October Friday evening when a cool breeze blows down Prince Street and the sun is setting and the leaves on the small trees that line the street are bright yellow, a ridiculous yellow, the kind of yellow you wouldn’t even believe if it wasn’t right here.

Warm as yellow.

In walks one of our favorite regular customers, an 11-year-old boy who is precocious and creative and talkative and loves to visit the shop. Sometimes if one of his parents is running errands in the city they’ll drop him off at the store and let him hang out with us for a bit. In this day and age, with all the crazies out there, it’s an honor they entrust him to us, even for short stretches of time.

I’m always asking him about what he’s reading and he’s always filling me in on his most recent linocut work. He wonders about what books we are selling. He’s always asking when I’m writing the sequel to The Edge of Over There, and I’m always telling him, Someday, buddy. Someday.

We talk for a minute and then I see his dad on the front porch with their dog, so I go sit out there on the brick wall and we catch up. Police race by on their way to some disaster and drivers honk their horns in frustration at the traffic. People are happy on their way to dinner and a group laughs and goes into the restaurant next door. The city is alive and splendid and decked out in autumn. The book shop sits like the sun at the center of the city, at the center of the universe. It’s outside of time.

His dad takes a picture of me and my 11-year-old friend sitting on the front porch, catching up. It’s a regular old moment, an everyday sort of moment. He was probably telling me about his recent trip to see his grandmother, who makes the best chocolate cake. I was probably telling him about some book he needs to read.

Yet when I see that photo later—the light, the golden light, coming from inside the store and us talking and the glow of fall and the porch light and the sidewalk and the brick as perfect as it is—something else seems to be going on. Something more important. Something that will reach long into the future, stretch from generation to generation.

His dad will later write on Facebook,

There’s times when I remind myself, “don’t miss it”. When all the world seems chaotic. When I wonder if my heart will endure another day of my own emotions, news cycles and the fuckery of damaged egos. When one more salesman, product, politician, or soothsayer promises to ease whatever tension may or may not exist. And then I see my kid, talking to our town bookstore owner, laughing and discussing dreams and ideas. This is hope. This is magic in a world that cannot understand how love, books, ideas, conversations face-to-face, and light reflecting from a cozy nook can inspire more passion and change than any of those aforementioned hucksters can ever promise.

Success.

What is it?

What really matters?

Later, when Maile and I read the dad’s post together, there are tears in our eyes. We are learning (though we are slow learners) that success in this life is about so much more than dollars and cents, profit and loss, balance sheets and daily sales. Maybe the greatest success happens just outside the book shop, on the front porch, in the light of autumn, discussing dreams and ideas.

This is a long game we’ve begun, one that may never be financially easy but has the potential to “inspire more passion and change than any of those aforementioned hucksters can ever promise.”

What really matters to you?

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If you’re so inclined, go on and check out our bookshop’s Substack HERE.